After hearing about a good friend’s torment and anguish at being witness to the spotting and photographing of tooooo many rhino carcasses in the last few week, I decided on Tuesday to go and look for ‘my’ rhino. To me, this is so pertinent now, with all the killings happening and the savage poaching of so many of these magnificent creatures all over the country. 
The story behind ‘my’ rhino:
15 years ago John Mc Claren, Ernst Greyling and I became the first people to ever witness and record the birth of a baby white rhino. We knew the mother, whom we named Ouvrou, was pregnant, but were not sure how far or when she would give birth. So there we embarked on a 1 year journey into the life of a 30 something, massive mommy rhino and her rhino family. Being the matriarch of the crash, it was initially easy to follow her as we would just look for the herd, and we would be sure that she would be in there somewhere. She was also clearly identifiable by her impressive, magnificent 1.135m horn. What a sweet majestic gentle creature she was. After about 3 months she eventually got used to these 3 nosey people following her every move. The guys would do the day shift and i would do the night shift, sometimes accompanied by one of the guys. This was a hard, trying and emotional time for all of us, but thankfully we were all determined to make sure Ouvrou and her baby would have the best possible chance and we would be able to get the footage.
She eventually gave birth to a healthy, happy little (about 40kg 😉 ) female baby in the freezing cold, very early hours of the morning of the 2nd July 1999. Strangely, she did not move away from the heard and the bull just happened to be in attendance. What an honour and privilege to witness and film this first hand with my own eyes. (all be it with a normal video camera, but it did the job). The baby was named Shelby, and her name later changed to Emuva, which means ‘backwards’ in Zulu, as she was a breach birth (Bum out first). Her name was then changed again to “Scar”, due to a prominent scar on her horn. 
Sadly and tragically, Ouvrou was poached 3 years ago. 🙁 She and the calf she had with her at the time were shot from a helicopter. The savage poachers then proceeded to hack off her magnificent horn, almost taking off her whole face!! What a sad sad day for me and all those who had the privilege of getting to know this old girl. (Note…this was not the only rhino poached on this reserve. It was a well-planned and sophisticated operation and more than likely an inside job!, which is still supposedly being investigated??)
Thankfully “our” baby, now named Scar, who by that time was about 11 years old, was unharmed. I have followed her progress as she has reached maturity and seen her grow into a wonderful mother herself, already having had 4 healthy calves. Hopefully, L-rd willing, I will be able to witness one of her births and pray that she and her babies will be safe. Keep checking our posts to follow her progress.
Above: Recent photo of Scar, just before she was dehorned.